1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fluorescent imaging device that generates a fluorescent image and a fluorescent image acquiring method.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, endoscopes are designed to be widely used for inspection and diagnosis of living tissue of diseased parts in the body cavity or the like. Furthermore, as disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2003-61909, there is a fluorescent imaging device that generates a fluorescent image to make it easier to diagnose whether living tissue is an abnormal (lesioned) region or a normal region by picking up an image using auto fluorescence emitted from the living tissue.
The fluorescent imaging device of the related art irradiates the living tissue with excitation light and reference light and generates a reference image as an image by returning light of the reference light through image pickup and a fluorescent image by fluorescence. Furthermore, this related art discloses a configuration which takes advantage of the fact that the intensity of a green light region of auto fluorescence in the lesioned region is lower than a normal region of the living body, and further uses a threshold of the luminance of the fluorescent image generated, and thereby extracts, colors and displays the lesioned region (tumor, cancer).